Locals Only: Ek-Statik

Wednesday

People sometimes make lame jokes about how Alive's Bands to Watch are actually Bands to Hear, but in the case of Shin Tower Music, the watching part is becoming ever more important.

People sometimes make lame jokes about how Alive's Bands to Watch are actually Bands to Hear, but in the case of Shin Tower Music, the watching part is becoming ever more important.

The experimental electronic group is incorporating video, dance, visual art and more into its increasingly elaborate events. Consider "Ek-Statik," the BFA thesis of Shin Tower's Tristan Seufert, planned for next Thursday at sundown outside Hopkins Hall on the Oval.

The Ohio State fine arts student aims to gather 100-plus musicians for a spontaneous musical mob and another 50-plus people to dance and sing along. Non-musicians are encouraged to bring a flashlight, laser pointer or other light instrument.

The goal is to blur lines between disciplines and between audience and performer. Massive video projection cues will facilitate that merger, as will surprise "pedestrian" dancers in the crowd.

"The overall goal is that we basically play as one band at once, and it's not chaos," Seufert said. "And if it is chaos, that's kind of like a postmodern idea that it's OK to kind of embrace the chaos."

Seufert said he expects several full drum sets and myriad unusual instruments in play. The Facebook RSVPs range from middle-school kids to gray-haired strangers.

"A good half of the people who are attending the event, I don't know who they are," Seufert said, "and I really love that."

E-mail your local music news to Chris DeVille at cdeville@columbusalive.com